Just two days after U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann said she will not run for re-election next year in Minnesota's 6th Congressional District, her Democratic opponent Jim Graves has dropped out of the race, too.

"This was never about Jim Graves; this was about challenging the ineffective leadership and extremist ideology of Michele Bachmann on behalf of those she represents," Graves said in a statement Friday. "As of Wednesday, that goal was accomplished."

Last fall, Bachmann eked out a 4,296-vote victory over Graves, a hotel and restaurant developer, in Minnesota's most conservative congressional district.

The Republican's 50.5 percent of the vote was nearly 6 percentage points less than what GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney received in the suburban/exurban district north of the Twin Cities.

Graves's decision to leave the race was a letdown to Democratic leaders in Minnesota and nationally. But Bachmann's announcement that she wouldn't seek re-election in 2014 also was a blow to opponents hoping to capitalize on her polarizing personality and defeat her. Nationally, Democrats were prepared to give Graves the financial support to do that, something they didn't do last year.

Minnesota's Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party chairman Ken Martin said that while he is disappointed Graves dropped out, Graves has laid the groundwork for other Democrats in the district and expects the party will be able to field a strong candidate.

"It's not often an open seat becomes available for a seat in Congress," Martin said in a statement.

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"Although it's a conservative district, with the right candidate this is a great opportunity for Democrats."

Republicans, though, characterized it as a part of growing trend of a Democratic "recruiting wreckage" across the country.

"As another one of the national Democrats' top recruits drops out, Nancy Pelosi's fantasy of Democrats reclaiming the House becomes further out of reach every day," said Alleigh Marre, spokeswoman for the National Republican Congressional Committee.

Bachmann spokesman Dan Kotman said that by dropping out, Graves exposed himself as "nothing but a pathetic, insincere fraud who never cared about serving the people of Minnesota."

"The only mission Jim Graves accomplished was wasting $500,000 of his own money on a race that he lost last year and would have lost again next year by a considerably wider margin," Kotman said in a statement.

The 6th Congressional District, which spans from the St. Croix River valley through the northern Twin Cities suburbs to the St. Cloud area, traditionally is a challenge for Democrats. It's the reddest in Minnesota, where about 57 percent of voters lean Republican, according to a Pioneer Press analysis based on statewide elections in 2010. And the Cook Political Report's "Partisan Voting Index" gives the GOP a 10 percentage-point advantage there.

In April 2012, Graves said he entered the race because his family believes Bachmann isn't good for the district or the country.

"The way that she divides rather than unites. The way that she attacks rather than builds. The way she excludes rather than bring people into the big tent," Graves said then.

He won the DFL endorsement that month over business owner Brian McGoldrick of May Township and St. Cloud lawyer Anne Nolan.

Graves grew up in the district, paying his own way at St. Cloud's Cathedral High School and later St. Cloud State University. He married his high school sweetheart, Julie.

In 1979, he founded the AmericInn chain with the company's first motel in Rogers. Graves sold the business in 1993 for an undisclosed amount of money but has said it was in the "seven-figure range."

Now, his company Graves Hospitality is focused on high-end hotel and restaurant developments. His net worth is between $22 million and $111 million, according to financial disclosure forms he filed before the 2012 election.

National Democrats played down Graves' decision as a blow to the party. Brandon Lorenz, regional press secretary for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, said the group expects the district will "feature a bitter Republican primary fight over who can get the furthest to the right the fastest, and we'll monitor the race as it develops."

Political observers say Democrats have misjudged the 6th District time and again. Last year, when Graves narrowly lost to Bachmann, he received no financial help from the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.

Meanwhile, fellow Democrat Rick Nolan, who took on incumbent Republican congressman Chip Cravaack in Minnesota's 8th District, received more than $1.9 million in anti-Cravaack media buys from the powerful fundraising arm.

And he handily defeated Cravaack 54 percent to 45 percent.

David Schultz, a public policy professor at Hamline University in St. Paul, said Democrats did just the opposite in 2010. They pumped millions of dollars into beating Bachmann, making the race the most expensive in House history. But their candidate, former state Sen. Tarryl Clark, lost by more than 12 percentage points.

"It looks like the Democrats have miscalled the Bachmann races almost consistently. I don't know if it's bad luck or what it is," Schultz said.

When Bachmann revealed her decision not to run, Graves had a couple of advantages over any Republican -- name recognition and organization. But Schultz said Graves had defined himself as the anti-Bachmann candidate. And that doesn't work without her in the race.

Now, the DFL has a thin bench of promising candidates. And given that it's a midterm election, which usually means low voter turnout and more losses for the sitting president's party, Schultz said it doesn't look good for Democrats in the 6th District.

"Democrats are not in good shape and lost any advantages they had with this announcement," Schultz said.